Some pet owners can't be satisfied with dogs, cats or parakeets. Some in Florida had to buy young pythons. Now we have a python problem. Others wanted iguanas; now we have an iguana problem.
Invasive iguanas destroy local infrastructure such as sidewalks, foundations and canal banks, and landscape vegetation. They can also transmit salmonella.
These reptiles tend to colonize along man-made canals. Trapping and relocating them is forbidden, because they can transmit viruses and bacteria to other wildlife.
The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission provided $63,000 for a humane elimination project. Blunt force to the head will do it, but if a second blow is necessary, it could be animal cruelty punishable by prison time and a fine.
A team of marine biologists was deputized to kill as many as possible. Bolt guns, common in the cattle industry, to the brain are favored. After one month, the score was 249 iguanas.
One would think pythons could do the job, but iguanas are borrowing a bit north of where the snakes congregate in the Everglades.
Jimmy
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